In 1984 I was 14, took a part time job at a franchised video store. There were 2 managers and 4 of us part timers. Fast forward a year, the store gets bought and the new owner changes the store name, gets rid of the managers, promotes 2 twenty something part timers to manager to replace them, and gets rid of the other PT kid, leaving just me.
Now, I was an aspiring artist at the time, and every month I’d take home some poster board and Frankenstein some crazy monthly promo together for the store. Being the only part timer, I worked 5-6 nights a week even during the school year, which went on for close to 2 years. Then one day the owner calls me into his office when I arrive for my shift.
Proceeds to tell me, like he’s reading from a cue card, that there’s been money missing from the register in $20 increments on nights that I’ve worked, and if it didn’t stop, he was going to press charges. A bit in shock, I asked him to repeat, and he says the same exact words, again like he had a script in front of him.
Of course, i wasn’t stealing anything. I was just floored, and working my shift that night, I talk to the manager, who says this is the first he’s heard of it (and he counts the drawers!), like WTF. Went home and talked to my parents, who both immediately told me to quit, which was a relief, because I thought they would be angry if I wasn’t working.
Next day I walked in for my shift, marched straight to the owners office, and told him I could no longer work for him after what happened. Guy looked like I just poured an espresso in his lap – he stood straight up and said “you can’t! I have no one to replace you!” And in a moment of unusual zen calm for me, I said “strange you didn’t think about that when you accused me of stealing with zero evidence.” I walked out, told the manager I was done, and never looked back.
Ofc, it’s a lot easier to do that when stakes are low. It took me more than twenty years as an adult to internalize the message this whole situation was sending me: know your worth, and don’t work for anyone telling you it’s less than, or you’ll start believing them.